Tuesday, July 5, 2011

Vicarious Travels

I just got a wonderful long letter from my teacher, Denise, whose picture you will find in this blog in a few places, telling all her students about her trip of a lifetime to India. She goes to India a couple of times of year and has for some time, but this time, she did some things she had always wanted to do, such as taking a long train trip, not first class, but the way the Indians do it. It was 29 hours from Pune to Varanisi, where she bathed in the Ganges and spent quite a bit of time living with an Indian family. One part of the journey involved a harrowing trip to the Indian style potty, garbed in a pair of wide Indian pants and flowing scarf that fell into the toilet as she was trying to use it, jostled as she was by the train. She took back to Pune a souvenir of Ganges water to give away as gifts, but she made the mistake of putting it in a Coke bottle, and someone drank it. Luckily, that person was an Indian, used to the water, or this could have had harrowing consequences! I wish I could have been there! This, and all the wonderful yoga at the Institute of course, where Denise got to study with her teacher, Geeta, Mr. Iyengar's daughter, sound like an amazing experience. When you meet someone as full of life and with so much to give as Denise, you feel lucky to be in her presence. She really is a very special person.

About Me

It feels odd to tell people, when they ask you what you do, that you are a poet. It is of course not a proper profession, if by "proper" one means a job that brings in money.
It is most certainly an occupation though. Reading, writing, going to poetry events make up a sizable percentage of my life.